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In today’s world education pays, but not just formal education. By the time universities have classes in real world market skills, those skills are already downgraded due to newer skills which are in higher demand. I am wondering for example how many schools are teaching Final Cut Pro 7 when shops are either moving ahead with Final Cut Pro X or Adobe Premiere Pro.

If you do video editing, this one is for you. I used to hate the way Final Cut Pro 7 took so much time to render. I have even seen slow rendering during online tutorials and watched while the instructor has to talk about something while he is waiting for the computer to catch up. Apparently other NLE’s have the same problem. Now along comes Final Cut Pro X which has instantaneous and/or background rendering and it has really speeded things up. The Internet vitriol on what FCPX doesn’t have has overshadowed what FCPX does have. This video is a fun commentary on such silliness.

Now that I have Final Cut Pro 10.0.1 successfully installed I can make a quick comment about it. As usual, there were some kinks trying to get mine updated. As usual, I wasted time thinking it was something I was doing wrong. I have detailed the problems in my previous blog post. What it amounted to was I could not see the update in the App Store app nor in the Software Update. I first checked with my friend Matt Schalk at MacInfinity.com. He reported no problems.

Apple’s Motion 5 and Compressor 4 updated today via the App Store. If you are Chinese and are using clustering you will for sure want the Compressor update! Also it appears that Apple addressed some stability issues with Soundtrack Pro for Compressor 4 users. The big Motion 5 update is support for dual displays. So it appears that these 2 packages are moving forward. I heard about an FCPX update but it didn’t show up in my app store or in software update. So I tried something else and wow, it really messed me up.

I’ve talked before about slow motion with Final Cut Pro X and optical flow. Here is another example, this time shot on the 5D Mark II which maxes out at 30fps. The footage was slowed to 10% using FCPX retiming feature and optical flow. This example is by UK-based photographer Timothy Cochrane. I contacted Tim and he informed me that this was shot at 25fps 1/60 shutter at about 400 iso and f4.

Of course by now most folks interested in film editing are catching on to the controversy that is Final Cut Pro X. In their effort to ‘redefine post-production for professionals,’ Apple, in their Infinite 1 Loop wisdom, has decided that the film industry needs to jettison industry standard editing terms.

From www.Korduroy.tv a fair and balanced video review of Final Cut Pro X. Korduroy.tv is an accomplished producer of surf films and had considerable experience with Final Cut Pro. In the video he does a great job explaining the strengths of FCPX but then goes on to talk about some of the weaknesses. You can be the judge of whether this product is for you.

Writing about the new Event Manager X got me thinking about how Apple actually organizes things with Final Cut Pro X. I have already spent some time working with moving projects. From everything I read projects were to be contained in some sort of database that generates speed and other database advantages. I did some testing to find out just how true that statement was.

If you haven’t figured it out by now, basically FCPX puts your projects and events in one of two places: